Raring to go? Or Reluctant to Show?

Some things you need to know how to do before you do it. Like, skydiving. You need to know a little bit about skydiving before you jump out of a plane. 'Figuring it out' probably isn't the greatest idea.

This principle also applies to juggling chainsaws, heart surgery, and wiring a house's electrical system. These things require research, foreknowledge, and practice without having to do the real thing.

Having said that, if all you ever did was research how to skydive, you'd miss out on the whole point of researching... the dive itself!

I think this can also apply to writing. When you write a book, you don't send your first draft of the first seriously written piece of work you ever write. That thing is going to be full of junk 99% of the time. If you don't invest some real time into it, it just isn't going to work.

Getting a book published isn't just something you add to your list of things to do today. It's not for the faint of heart, and it's not for impatient people. I've been noticing this a lot lately.

There's so much practice that goes into this before you do the 'real thing' and go for an agent. I've personally been working seriously on the craft of writing for years. There are thousands of people who have worked much harder and longer than I have who are still unpublished.

I feel like most writers fall into one of two categories. Maybe I'm wrong, but it seems to me like either we are:

A: Raring to go.

or

B: Reluctant to show.

Raring to Go

These are the people who can't wait to get their novel published. They whip out their pens/laptops and write furiously until their nobel prize worthy masterpiece is born. This child, like an infant in a doctor's hands, is handed over to agent after agent in search of someone willing to bring him to adulthood. But no one is willing, 'cause this is one messed up kid.

Often when we're so eager to get something out, we overlook little errors, inconsistencies, or big picture issues. It's our baby after all. Of course it's perfect! What we don't realize is that not everyone sees this child through rose-coloured glasses. We need a healthy dose of reality. We need to wake up and realize that our work may just not be perfect after one draft.

Reluctant to Show

These people have the opposite problem of never taking their writing anywhere but the drawing board. They're convinced it will never be good enough, and that they must do continual edits on it. Before anyone can ever see it, it needs to be perfect. So it stays tucked in a desk drawer, never to be brought out, or sitting in an unmarked folder in the corner of the screen.

We're so afraid of rejection that we'll do anything to put off hearing the truth about our skill level. Yes. You may be average. No, you're probably not the next Tolkein. But you know what? THAT'S OK. No one really wants another author who wrote just like Tolkein. It would get old to have little identical copy cats of famous authors running around. Who would be left to reinvent a genre? Who would be there to make that next B-Level novel to satiate the masses of consumers of normal, run-of-the-mill books?

You may not be as great as you hoped. Oh no. But wouldn't you rather at least know than spend your whole life wondering? Wouldn't that be better?


What we writers need to do is find a happy medium. Somewhere between practicing forever, and never practicing at all. Somewhere between total confidence, and no confidence whatsoever. A place where we are free to make mistakes, but wisely choose to make as few as possible. A place where it's actually possible to get published.

All in all, a place of relative normalcy... whatever that is.


So what are you? Raring to Go? Or Reluctant to Show?

Characters don’t run your story

SO, I realize it’s been forever since I last posted.  Mostly I’d like to say that’s because I’ve been super busy.

Mostly it’s because I’ve been super lazy.

It’s one of the strangest feelings when you say you’ll get back to something once things are normal again, and then you realize your normal is gone. I kept saying once I was back into the swing of things I’d be back into writing, but not going back to school for the first time in my life meant things would not go back to the way they were. That took some getting used to.

ANYWAY.

So over the summer, as those of you who know me will know, (and of course I have a HUGE following of people who don’t know me, so don’t feel left out if you’re part of that group that numbers in the millions, if not dozens of people) I was teaching English at a Quebec summer camp. (I should write another post about how annoying lots of random notes in parentheses can be). I enjoy talking about this camp for a number of reasons. It was a big part of my life for a few months, and I find it easy to pull analogies out of.

This particular analogy is about characters telling the author what to do. Some writers claim that at a certain point, their creations just run amuck, and do whatever they want, and that the author has no control. I will admit that there was a time when I indulged this kind of thinking, but NO MORE. This is really a very nonsensical thought. (And not for the reason all you non-writers out there are thinking). It’s not because your works can’t develop a life of their own, it’s because you as the author should know much better than your creation what’s good for them.

When I was teaching English, there were some things my kids liked to argue about that were just plain wrong.

“BUT SEVEEEEEEEEEN!!! They would wail. “You don’t say ‘I am 12 years old’, it’s ‘I have 12 years old’!!! Everyone knows that!!!” Now, in French, if you were to literally translate what they were saying, they’d be right, because that’s how it’s said in French, but they didn’t fully understand the English version, and so we argued about it. Many of them still don’t believe me. Another day, I was discussing contractions, and when presented with the two options “You’d not”, and “You wouldn’t” 100% of the class voted for the former as the more proper version. Clearly, you don’t let students run the class, and in the same way, you clearly don’t let characters run your story.

So what if Sally wants to jump off the bridge because her stupid werewolf boyfriend dumped her for an X-Men? She’s not gonna kill herself two chapters in! She’s your protagonist! And you know better than she does! You know that in the end she gets to take that werewolf down with a silver bullet to the chest in that awesome Western Showdown you’ve got going on in Chapter 73!

“BUT HER EMOTIONS!!!” You whine.

“SO WHAT?!” I calmly reply. You need to learn to work around her emotions to get her through, otherwise you’ll just end up with garbage in the end. Letting your characters be real is one thing, letting them take over is another thing entirely. Don’t give in to imaginary-peer pressure.

Say ‘No’, to character enabling.

Have you ever heard of authors claiming their characters are running the show? What are your thoughts on this? Is it crazy? Genius? Pitifully psychotic? Let your voice be heard!


*SIDENOTE* - To all my awesome Quebec friends, just so you know, anytime I mention my crazy times with my francophone students I am in no way trying to offend any of you. Just wanna put that out there. I LOVE YOU GUYS!! :P

Good Afternoon Good Evening and Good Night!

One of my all-time favourite movies (as in, in my top ten) is The Truman Show. If you haven't seen it, you really should. It's one of those movies that just blows your mind. For me, it was like the Matrix, or Inception... for others, not so much. What can I say? One man's junk is another man's treasure.

Those of you who haven't seen this movie, I will briefly describe what it was about. Basically, this guy Truman was adopted as an infant by a corporation to be the star of a reality TV show in which he would star. But he has absolutely no idea this is happening. He seemingly goes through life normally, unaware that every person he's ever met is an actor, and everything he's ever done has been seen by millions. The story follows his journey to discovering the truth, all the while questioning what 'real' really means.

I love this movie for so many reasons. One of the things I like is how it jabs at the way our culture is so transfixed with reality TV, and what that's doing to our outlook on life. The audience seems completely unconcerned with the fact that this man is being manipulated and controlled for his entire life without consent for their entertainment. Sure they might be distressed when Truman is being battered near death in his sailboat in the storm the producers made for him, but they show only as much concern as they would any other character from a movie or TV show. They don't stand up demanding the producers to put a stop to it, they don't cry out in outrage. They just watch. Glued to their screen, wondering "Is he gonna make it?"

Another reason I like it, is because the idea that everyone you've ever met is an actor is a profound idea. What if your entire life was a lie? How would you possibly know? I think the producer put it best when he said (forgive me if it's not exact) "We accept the world with which we've been presented." So what kind of world have you been presented with? Is there a possibility that it's all been a lie?!?

Like I said. Mind blowing.

One other interesting tidbit, is that this movie doesn't really fit snugly into a genre. At least not to me. It's kind of a love story, kind of a drama, kind of a comedy, but not a rom-com, and not a fluff piece...

It's just a story. And a darn good one at that.

Through the majority of the film, Truman is driven only by his own determination that something is not right with his world. Everyone is against him, and yet he cannot discern a single antagonist to act against. He's not really working to overcome some great evil, or right some terrible wrong, he's just searching for the truth. With everything he has in him. To me, that's really inspiring.

One could also argue that he's driven by his desire to see Sylvia again, and I would be okay with that interpretation. However, personally I think the search for truth is just as important to him as his potential relationship with the woman he loves.

So what am I trying to say with all this? That sometimes, a book is just a book. I think we do a disservice to many books when we slap a label on them. Now, I understand that we can't just not label books, because then, where would we put them in the bookstore? General? That would get crowded pretty fast. No. What I'm saying is, I don't think we should get so hung up on genre when it comes to what books we'll read.

I'll be the first to say that I write sci-fi, but I'm really not a hard-core sci-fi fan. Before you crucify me, let me say one thing in my defense. I have read many sci-fi books, and what I've found, is that the ones I like,  I really like. And it's because they have really cool ideas, or great characters, or plots that drive you to read on forever. What I don't like, is when either A. The book is so focused on the setting that it neglects to develop anything else, or B. When a book gets boring, or complicating beyond belief. What is my point in saying all that? Simply this.

I like good books.

I will not say I like sci-fi but not romance, or I like thrillers but not spy books. I'm just a fan of well written books. It really doesn't matter to me what kind of book it is. I just want a good story. So, bringing it full circle, I like the Truman Show because it's a great story. And on top of that, it proves that you don't have to be a stereotypical genre piece to be good at what you do. If you just tell your story the way it's supposed to be told without giving in to the gimmicks of the genre, you'll do far better in the long run in making a great piece of art.

Having said that, not many people know what The Truman Show is. Is that because I'm alone in saying it's great, or because it didn't fit into a nice little box that people could understand and gravitate towards? But I digress.

I'm gonna leave you with that. What do you think of genre? Do you think it's a necessity to fit a label, if only for convenience's sake? Should we embrace a new way in which we don't have to label everything? Or is this topic only relevant to the few books that actually have trouble fitting into specific categories?


PS. I didn't get to say goodbye to everyone here in Calgary yet, and I know my time is short. So in case I don't see you, good afternoon good evening and good night! :D

Internal Conflict

Inside my body a war rages on.


Between good and evil
Between darkness and light
Between antibodies and the flu


It's a bloody mess inside my arteries, hemoglobin scattered everywhere, poor little parentless platelets running scared. It's chaos. But let's get straight to the heart of the matter with one question. Is this struggle against a foreign body all in vein?


I'm sorry. I should be locked up in a cell for my careless use of puns.


Anyway, I'm planning on keeping this short so I can get lots of rest tonight. I just wanted to say how this cold reminded me of what a realistic character always needs. External, and Internal conflict.


External


My external conflict in this case is my battle against a cold. I know, that sounds like it's going on inside my body, but it's something that manifests itself in a physical, visible way, so I count it as external. If others can see it, then I think it's external. Also, external means it's against something other than yourself.


Characters that are never conflicting with anything around them are boring, uninteresting, and very unrealistic. Most people don't have too much difficulty with this one. You need to have something opposing your hero, or else nothing will happen. There won't be any action.


Internal

This is the one that gets people sometimes. For example, you probably didn't guess just by what I said here that I had some internal conflict going on where part of me actually wanted to be sick did you?

It's true! Part of me was saying last night "I actually kinda hope I am really sick tomorrow. Because then I'd take the day off work." Now, don't get me wrong, I love my job, it's a great place to work. However, I'm leaving in a little over a week, and with all the stuff that I have on my plate right now, a day off right now would be really nice.

Having said that, I probably would have just slept the whole day if I had been really sick. That's fine for the most part, except for the whole being sick part.

The reason why I had this conflict, was because of my opposing values.

1. I love being healthy.
2. I love having days of rest.

Last night, these two values were at odds with each other, because I knew that I could only really have one thing. Either I'll be healthy(ish) tomorrow, and work and get really tired, or I'll be sick enough to take the day off to rest. In this particular case, I didn't actually have a choice in the matter, but that's really moot at this point.

What's important is that this conflict changed everything. This conflict was what made my thoughts even slightly interesting to listen to. If you're inside a character's head for any length of time, it better have some wicked stuff going on in there, or else you're gonna put me to sleep. If all he's thinking is Oh no, I better beat this cold! Then woop-dee-do, wow, he doesn't want to get sick.

If the princess is in a tower, and Prince Charming wants to kill the dragon to rescue her, then that's great. But if he's only rescuing her to appease his controlling mother who wants him to marry the enchanted princess instead of his little village sweetheart, it's suddenly more interesting. Why is he doing it? Does he actually care about this princess' fate? What is it about the village girl that's so appealing? And why is he so concerned about what his mother thinks?


Clearly Mr. Charming has a lot to think about besides fighting dragons. And that makes you want to read about him. At least that's the kind of thing I'm looking for.


There it is! Short and sweet. Now I'm going to fight this monster for all I'm worth, because as much as I hate working while under the weather, I hate letting people (including co-workers) down more.

Life of a Story Addict

No matter how many stories I read/hear/watch/tell, it will never be enough for me. I can say that to you with complete certainty. I'm a story addict through and through.

But what does that really mean?

It means that I'm a voracious reader, and listener of audio books, I can talk with someone for hours about our lives and the things we've seen and done, and movies/video games have always been a love of mine. When I was little, one of my favourite things to do was play pretend. I'd run through the woods in my backyard being chased by a minotaur, or hide top-secret information on CD's in my high-security tree fort.

In a way, I never grew out of playing pretend, it just transferred from acting out these stories to acting in school plays/musicals, and writing stories of my own. I'm quite certain many if not all of the people still reading this post up to this point can relate with me here. When I'm engaged in a story, I'm completely immersed in that world. I often find myself actually portraying on my face the different emotions an author expresses in words on a page. Sometimes when a storyteller is vivid enough with their explanations, even when it's a friend telling me of their adventures, I feel like it was actually me who experienced all these things, and my friend is simply the narrator explaining it all.

For me, where it seems to become a bit different than most people I know, is I'm almost never actually content with just finishing a book. There are times when I'll get a chapter or two away from the end and I start to slow down to a glacial pace because I know I'll go through withdrawals if I stop reading at that point. Sometimes even if it was a very good ending, I'll be really depressed because the book's over, and I have to go find something else to read.

With that in mind, add the fact that I'm extremely picky about what I read. Unless I'm thoroughly convinced I'll enjoy the book, I won't read the first chapter, and if I don't get sucked in within a couple pages I'm done. It's back on the shelf, and I have to find something else.

It really is like I'm some kind of drug addict who can't get a buzz off the weaker stuff anymore. I've been taking it too long, and now my body's immune to it. I have to have really good stories to fuel me. Anything sub-par just won't cut it anymore.

This goes for movies and video games too. If I'm watching a movie, and it has incredible special effects and flashy, attractive A-list stars but no real substance, I'm gone. If I'm playing a role playing game where there is absolutely no attempt made at constructing an interesting, or even logical plot, it's very hard to engage me.

All these things make up my profile as a story addict. One who needs stories all the time, but also can't stand mediocrity. I love to be in the midst of reading a book, but I hate hate hate ending one. Especially a series. One series in particular, The Circle Series, by Ted Dekker, was a series that I grew up reading, and was essentially what made me love books so much that it got me to start writing. The first three books came out in 2005, but the last book came out in 2009. At this point I thought the story was over, but to my everlasting joy and excitement the story could continue! With this book, I limited myself to a chapter a day, no matter what. It was excruciating. Every day I would battle with myself to either not read anything so that there would be more to read later, or to read as much as possible because I loved it all so much. This was the book where the tug-of-war inside me was most evident. I wanted so badly to finish it all, but I wanted desperately for it to never end.

Since this book came out in 2009, I've made it a tradition of mine to re-read the entire series every summer. And it still hasn't gotten old for me.

The thing that really sucks about this set of attributes, is that I'm someone who absolutely loves to write, but at the same time I'm my own worst critic. I'm super critical of what everyone else writes, and this criticism inevitably bleeds into my own writing. My inner editor is very loud and annoying. I want to tell stories, but I basically want them to be perfect before I share them with anyone. This is obviously not going to happen anytime soon.

So my dilemma is knowing how much critique is too much. Where do you draw the line? I have to revise my books of course, but how many times will be 'enough'? When will I be satisfied with my work?

With my current work in progress, it's gone through one revision, and will go through a second set of revisions once my friend is done reading it and giving me their thoughts on it. I feel like I simultaneously love and hate this book right now.

It's my baby that has spent two years as an infant. Everybody loves kids, but eventually, they have to grow up. Right now, I just really want this baby to go through publication puberty. It's gonna be nasty, there will be lots of changes it won't understand. But it has to happen.

My goal is to start looking for agents by the end of June... scary. Final edits, here I come!

Any other story addicts out there? Do you have a story burning inside you?

Just get it over with!

Isn't it funny how often the fear of something happening is more terrible than the actual thing itself? It's an interesting fact of life that I've seen come up in my own experience over and over again. I've also seen the idea approached in many interesting ways.

My favourite example of this is from a cartoon I used to watch occasionally when I was in Junior High. I say occasionally because honestly, it wasn't all that great, but sometimes it would have an episode that was just golden. This one was just such an episode.

The basic premise was that in this kingdom, there was a monster that had come up from out of the sea and was approaching the town these characters lived in. This monster was very large, formidable, and dangerously powerful. That made the situation bad. What made it much worse, was the fact that this monster had the peculiar attribute of taking ever shorter steps. Each step it made toward the kingdom was half the length of the last step, and according to the calculations of a robot in the city, the monster would never stop approaching the city, but it would also never reach it.

The king thought this was excellent news, but the townspeople were nearly driven mad by this revelation, because they were in constant expectation of an attack. They were so fearful of what would happen that they eventually convinced the king to send people out to figure out a way to get the monster to actually get it to them right away and attack the kingdom! That's how desperate they were. So in the end, they succeeded, and the monster ran into the kingdom, destroyed a bunch of stuff, and ran off. When it was all over, the people celebrated in the streets because they could finally move on with their lives and stop living in fear!

These last few days I've been plagued with a certain decision I had to make, and now that I've made it, it's like a huge weight has been lifted off my shoulders. Honestly, this afternoon I didn't care what the outcome was anymore, I just wanted to be DONE. I was so sick of trying to decide and worrying about the consequences of the decision. No matter what the outcome was, I just wanted it to come so that I could deal with it and get it over with.


It's amazing to me how often this can be applied to novels. How much better is it to have the constant fear of death hanging over a character rather than just killing them outright? How much more intense is it to watch a character trying to figure out how something is going to happen rather than just finding out right away?

I see this as another thing that can kind of go hand in hand with the idea that the journey can oftentimes be more important than the destination. When I was building my tree-fort, I enjoyed the act of building just as much, if not more than just having it there in the woods. In the same way, I think that we can sometimes learn a lot more about ourselves, and about patience and confronting fear by going through these times of uncertainty. It forces us to really take a look at what we're doing and make tough choices. I feel like this has been a sucky couple of days to slog through, but in the end, I'm glad to have had them, because they've made me a better decision maker, and have challenged me in new, important ways.


How often do you wish you could skip the waiting and get straight to the outcome, be it good or bad?

Consistency is Key

So, I'm going to be totally honest here, and admit that I don't really have much of an idea of what to write for this post. It's pretty much totally on the fly. Most nights I get to my laptop and I've already had a few days to ruminate over what I want to say, but tonight, my muse seems to have taken a vacation. (As a side note, there's something that sparked my interest for a post about Korean Pop Music, but that's a whole other story involving in-depth analysis of culture and the value of art and such. Stuff that I need to research a bit more before posting about.)

So what will this post be about? Consistency. In the end, the reason why I'm posting right now, and not when I'm feeling "more inspired" is because it's Wednesday, and I need to have this post ready for tomorrow. Because I always have two posts a week. For those of you on the East Coast, I update it early Monday and Thursday morning. For those on the West Coast, I update late Sunday and Wednesday night. Even when I have some really awesome idea in between those times, I save it for one of those dates. Why? Because I want you guys to be able to anticipate when I post here. If I'm not consistent in when I post, then people are going to lose interest. It's a simple fact of blogging. But how true it is of so many other things in life!

Something that a lot of writers don't like to talk about is author branding. Not the kind that involves hot poking sticks, but the kind that defines what kind of author you are. For example, Stephen King is a writer of horror. If for some reason he wanted to write a romantic comedy for his next big hit, there would be a lot of confused fans. They'd say, "You can't write that! You write horror!" to which he may reply, "Too bad! I like rom-coms, and I'm going to write them if I feel like it! So there!" This obviously sounds ridiculous, but so many amateur novelists (me included), feel like we have the right to demand this!

We often say that we aren't a one trick pony, and that "of course, that's not the only side of me! I'm also a fantastic comedian! And you should read my non-fiction book on cooking with blubber, and my western/alien YA novellas, they're a huge hit. Almost as big as my legal thrillers from last year..."

Need I go on?

The point isn't that no one thinks you can do a good job of these books. That may or may not be an issue at this stage in the game. What's important is that you start gaining your fan's trust. You need them to see that you care about what they like and what they don't like, and that you're willing to give them that despite being able to write other stuff. Devoted fans will not keep coming to the same author if they don't reproduce the same kinds of books the reader fell in love with.

This isn't to say that an author can't possibly write in more than one genre, but I think it does mean that an author needs to be aware of who they're affecting, and how much influence they want to keep. Do you want lots of fans who kind/sorta know you a little bit? Or do you want substantially fewer people to know about you, and have them be the most devoted fans you'll ever see?


Bottom line is that you really can write whatever you want, but is that going to get you the readers that you want? When it comes to bringing people back for more, consistency is key. That means consistency in things as small as blog posts, and as big as the genre of your next novel.

How high up on your list of priorities is consistency? How have you been affected by inconsistent, or consistent people around you?

There's just something about a great -

cliffhanger.

The other day at work, we were discussing ways of helping kids learn to read. Since I work at a bookstore that sells homeschooling resources, we often get to talk to parents about teaching methods. Eventually we got to the topic of how to get a kid interested in reading on his own. One suggestion seemed really good to me. It was from a mom who had tried this, and found it worked really well.

When she read with her kids, she would always make sure she had 'something pressing' that she had to do as soon as the book got to a really exciting moment. She would have to go make dinner, or call a friend or something, and then leave the book on a coffee table, or somewhere close by where the kids could reach it.

Pure genius.

It may not have happened the first time, but eventually those kids started going to the books themselves because the cliffhangers proved to be just too much for them. It instilled in them an actual desire to read.

And it's pretty obvious why. No one needs to be taught how to be curious. No one needs to be told to expect conflict to be resolved at the end of the story. We all yearn for the satisfaction of closure. We want to see exciting things happen, and experience incredible twists, and then we want to see how it will all end.

I should be clear on one thing though, I don't see cliffhangers as something that can only come at the end of a novel. I see cliffhangers as something that can potentially come at the end of a chapter, or the end of a scene even. I define it as a moment that is so filled with suspense, shock, or intensity that to stop at that point would be impossible. It's a moment that demands a resolution. Fast.

Cliffhangers can prove to be incredibly powerful devices. When used properly, they can totally absorb a reader into reading well past their intended bedtime, or force a reader to break down and buy the book they're holding in the bookstore.

When you're writing, you always need to keep in mind how you're going to keep your reader's attention. You can't have exciting things happening on every page, or else it gets monotonous, and you'll lose your reader. You always need to be asking the question "Why are they still reading right now?"

If you can't answer that as a writer, then something serious is wrong with your book.

This goes beyond cliffhangers, and more into just what makes something worth reading. The 'so what' factor. Why are you reading this book? Because you want to see how it will end. Because you care. You need some underlying questions to keep the reader interested, and cliffhangers are basically as close as you can get to knowing the answers without being told. Or, they're the bomb that an author lets go at the very last page of a chapter that takes the reader's breath away, gives them new questions to ask, and makes them say "What just happened?! What's going to happen next?"

I remember one novel in a series ending with the lead character asleep in his bed while an assassin points a gun to his head and is about to pull the trigger. I didn't have the next book with me at the time, so I had to wait about a month before I knew what happened next.

That month was agonizing.

Cliffhangers truly are powerful things. But they are two-edged swords. When a book ends every chapter with a cliffhanger, it's much like when there's something exciting happening every page. It gets boring, and cliche. When your reader feels bored, they stop caring. And that's exactly the opposite of what you're trying to accomplish with your cliffhanger. You want them to care more about what's going to happen. So what's a writer to do?

I was going to say cliffhangers are like salt, a little goes a long way, but really, they're not needed as often as salt, so the metaphor doesn't really fit. What fits better is cinnamon. It can pack a punch when used well, but if you use too much it just overpowers the whole dish. I put too much cinnamon in my coffee the other day, and it ended up messing up the whole cup.

So at least for me, if you want me to enjoy your story, give me cliffhangers. But make them good, and make them rare. That's the kind of thing I'm going to tell my friends about. That's what's going to leave a good taste in my mouth.

Do you have a love/hate relationship with cliffhangers? Or just hate? What was the best cliffhanger you've ever seen/read? 

Why don't people listen?

I love audiobooks, but many of the people I know are either indifferent, or even vehemently against them. Why is that? I've often pondered this issue. The way I see it, there are essentially three different ways to 'read' a book. Through the traditional paper book, an e-book, or an audiobook. Some will debate me on this and say that audiobooks aren't reading, they're listening, but I say that's kind of splitting hairs, and it's just annoying to refer to it with a different verb, so for the sake of this post I'll refer to all of them as reading.

Each of these milieus have their own sets of pros and cons. Yet it seems that an overwhelming majority of people are still fans of paper and e-books over audiobooks. For starters, I thought it might help to look at a brief pros and cons list for just e-books and audiobooks.


E-BOOKS

Pro -
- A bit like an 'advanced' book in that it's much closer in representation to its original form.
- Not too much of a step away from 'normal' books.
- Easily accessible through libraries, bookstores, and online.
- Could be cheaper depending on how many books you read. (Ex. If you buy an e-reader for 150$, and buy three books, then you're not getting your money's worth. But if you read a couple books a month, then it's much cheaper).
Con -
- The purchase of an e-reading device can sometimes seem like too much of an investment.
- Reading on a computer can be a pain (if you don't have an e-reader)



AUDIOBOOKS

Pro -
- If it's acted well, it's easy to hear exactly what the inflection of the voices are during dialogue, no necessity to re-read a line because the last two words "he said" were unexpectedly changed with "he shouted", or "he sobbed".
- Brings the joy of books to the blind very effectively.
- Easy to listen to while doing other menial tasks (mowing the lawn, washing dishes, cleaning, taking transit)
- Occasionally faster - some books that would take me at least three weeks I can finish in a day or two because they're so hard to put down.
- Easy to share while reading (if you use speakers more than one person can read the same book at the same time)
Con -
- Not easily found, and not available for all books.
- Needs an audio device (although most people already own a compatible device beforehand)
- Difficult to share.
- Depends as much on the ability of the actor as the quality of the novel.
- Indistinguishable from listening to music, and therefore loses the advantage of having people see it and want it.

BOTH

Pro -
- Can easily transport many books at once while being much lighter and compact.
- Can be stored in multiple places (computer, Ipod, reader...) and thus are easier to keep safe.
Con -
- Require battery power.
- Aren't as 'natural' as paper books.
- No new books smell. :P


Based on those lists, it may seem like already e-readers are ahead of audiobooks just from sheer lack of cons. However, in my experience, the pros of the audiobooks are so powerful that they overcome their problems easily.

For me, what started as a summer tradition turned into a great appreciation for audiobooks. I used to (and still would if I lived at home) mow the lawn regularly during the summer, and every time this season rolled around, I would dread the weekly chore that took about an hour and a half due to the size of our property. This all changed one year, when I found out I could listen to one of my favourite books while mowing the lawn. I now read The Circle Series every year as I mow the lawn. I'm not sure when I'll fit it in this year, but I'm sure I won't stop the tradition anytime soon. I've now read these books about a dozen times, and I still love listening to them all. It's an incredible way to kill time, and get your mind off of whatever it is your doing at the moment.

I also listen to books on my morning commute to work. This hour a day means that I can usually finish a book in a week or two, and I never had to take real time out of my day to devote to reading. I simply do it when I'm unable to do anything else productive. I don't worry about getting carsick, or missing my bus stop because my face is buried in the pages, I just listen. For me, it's the perfect solution.

Yet so many people don't like them. Why? I think the reasons vary, but I know that at least for my sister, she can't handle having one person act out everyone's voices. She thinks it sounds stupid, and annoying (correct me if I'm wrong about this Kendra) and she much prefers paper books. Sometimes I wonder if Audio-Theatre, where there are many voices, and even sounds effects for everything. Some people (including my sister) STILL won't like it. Why?


One theory that I have on this is that they don't like being told how to imagine things. They see these voices in their heads as the 'only' way they can hear these characters. For some people that might rub them the wrong way.

I also think that it's a huge handicap that you can't really tell when someone is listening to an audiobook. It's so obvious when you're on the bus and you see someone reading on their Kobo, or their Kindle, and it doesn't really matter what they're reading, all that matters is they're advertising these companies just by sitting there and reading. But audiobooks look just like music to the outsider! How can audiobooks compete with that?

There's also the fact that it doesn't make sense to buy audiobooks at a bookstore, since it's much more expensive and troublesome to buy a set of CD's then it is to download them online. This means that audiobooks have essentially no publicity whatsoever. They have no specific device built for them, they have no bookstores campaigning for them, they're just alone in it for the long haul.

Why do you think audiobooks are unpopular? Or am I wrong, and they really are popular? What makes one person like to listen to a book and another like to read it?

And They All Lived Happily Ever After...

This has been something I've wondered about for quite a while now. Life isn't perfect, and not everyone has a happy ending to their story. Yet many people feel that every story they read should have a happy ending. Why?

I used to be part of this group of people, but I've found that over the years I've become more and more comfortable with bittersweet and even sad endings to the point where I don't mind how it ends as long as it makes sense for the story. But for the life of me I couldn't understand why this change had taken place until just recently.

I remember the first movie I ever watched as a kid that had a sad ending. I'm not sure if anyone still remembers this, but Ladder 49 came out when I was eleven years old, and at that time I was still pretty sensitive.

*Spoiler Alert*
In case you haven't already guessed, the ending is not very pleasant. If memory serves, it follows the life of a firefighter/group of firefighters. It started in a burning building, moved to a flashback which took up the majority of the film and then went back to the burning building where the firefighter died. I KNOW right!? He died! I couldn't believe it. This was absolutely unacceptable to me at the time.
*End Spoiler*

How could the good guys lose? That never happens right?

Over the next few years I saw that it did indeed happen. A lot more than I cared to know. There are times when life is really hard, and you don't get everything wrapped up at the end with a "Happily Ever After". So what was it that made me so mad about the outcome of that movie?

For me, I think it was my huge sense of justice. I can't stand to see people suffer for things they didn't do, and I hate to see people do awful things and get away with it. The good guys need to win, and the bad guys need to lose. At a young age, with the movies and books we read, it's really easy to tell who's the good guy and who's the bad guy. The writers make it clear from page one who you're supposed to root for.

But when you get older, you discover that in real life, there's no one who is perfectly good. Everybody is messed up in one way or another. Who's to say that villain didn't start out as a hero? Who's to say that hero won't be corrupted and turn to the dark side? In the real world, you have conflicted heroes, and sometimes you have sympathetic villains. That's part of what makes us human. We're not perfect.


I think once I started to grasp that, I was able to appreciate those sad and bittersweet endings more. At the end of the day, if you're absolutely completely honest with yourself, you know that no one really deserves to have a perfect story-book ending to their life. It wouldn't be just to just sweep everything the protagonist did under the carpet simply because he was the protagonist! Sometimes the only fitting ending is a sad one, because there are serious consequences for the times we mess up. But other people who are just as knowledgeable as I about the twisted nature of man still don't like sad endings. Why is that? Am I simply more morbid in my thinking? Am I just sick?

Let's assume for a moment that I'm not. I think the reason you watch/read stories will affect whether or not you can appreciate sad endings. There are two main factors that go into why someone looks for a story. I think most everyone will have both factors in place, but one may be more important to them than the other.

The first group of people read

For the Escape

If you read to get away from the troubles of the world, and escape to some land far away, then you won't like sad endings. You probably see reading as a chance to get away from the harsh realities of the real world, so obviously in your safe far-off land the good guys always win. That makes total sense. No one wants to imagine they're in a place that's sadder than the one they're in now. That just doesn't make any sense.

However, if you read

For the Experience

You may think in a totally different way.

Randy Ingermanson describes something called a "Powerful Emotional Experience". In his book "Writing Fiction For Dummies", and/or on his blog (probably both) he says that it's something that every novel needs to have, and I happen to agree with him wholeheartedly. This is because I am one of those people who reads primarily for the experience of it all.

When I read a book, I'm looking to experience some intense emotions. Fear, anger, love, joy, everything and anything. Personally, I want to be left breathless at the end of a book. Sometimes sad and bittersweet endings are much more powerful than happy endings. I know for me at least, they stick in my mind a lot better. They linger in the back of my head, and I'm left wishing it could have ended differently, and knowing that it couldn't have at the same time.


Having said that, I'm certain that no one reads a book or watches a movie for only one of these two reasons. There are probably countless other reasons as well, and they are all in a specific balance that's unique to each person. For some, they care more about the escape, some care more about the experience, and I think this is why there are lots of people out there who don't like sad endings.

I was talking with a few of my friends a while back about books that depict sad situations, and one aspect that we talked about was that when you have someone who's actually gone through "horrible situation x", they will very likely be offended if you just say "And they all got over it and lived happily ever after!" What are you saying? That if you try hard enough everything will just turn out peachy and perfect? That's not how life works, and sometimes ignoring that can be really annoying, and even insulting.

On the flip side, some people want hope when they read stories like that. They want to see the hero overcome all of that junk so that they can say "Ya! I CAN do this!" and press on. They need that encouragement to get through whatever they're going through.


The fact that I read mainly for the experience will definitely affect how I write, but that doesn't mean that my books are all going to be downers. It simply means that my intention in writing is to give you the most intense experience possible. I'm going to do my best to make you feel exactly how my characters feel, and I hope I'll be able to take your breath away. If making the ending sad is going to accomplish that, then I will definitely consider that option. But of course, nothing is set in stone at this point. Who knows what the end result of my first series will be!

What do you think determines whether or not you appreciate sad endings? Is it what I mentioned here, or something else?

As we all know

As we all know, when two or more people know something to be common knowledge, they don't typically take a couple pages of valuable novel space and reader time explaining it to each other.

Yet how many times have you seen this happen in books you've read? Or movies you've seen?


Why do writers do this? Is it because they're lazy? They just don't care? I think it's actually a problem that has to do with the mindset a writer is in when they write such a scene. I think for most situations, a writer either feels like the crucial information cannot be described in any way except between a couple experts. When this is not the case, the second most likely circumstance is that the writer simply does not realize this is a problem in any way.

Let me explain why I think this happens.

I think that when writers are at work, then can have very different perspectives on what their writing actually is. It all boils down to one thing - "I tell people stories." Depending on which word you put the emphasis on, it completely changes the meaning for you.

 "I tell people stories"

If the emphasis is on 'I', then you might have a writer who is only in it for the fame and glory of being a well-known author. I don't imagine these authors ever make it too far because they are the kind that will just settle for mediocre craft and vanity publishers who won't help them get anywhere further ahead in their careers.

"I TELL people stories"

If the emphasis in on 'tell', then it's all about the process of describing what's happening. These people really focus on the craft, and the experience of telling. I imagine these people would probably really like to write literary fiction, and would focus a lot on the prose.

"I tell PEOPLE stories"

Then there are those who put the emphasis on people, these guys are thinking about their reader at all times when writing a book. This is often a really good thing, they're writing what they know their target audience will like to read, and for the most part that's exactly what you have to do, but I think that these people can easily fall into the trap of "my reader needs to know this". This can be devastating for your novel if you let it go too far.

When this thinking is let out of hand, you end up with problems like info-dumping in your first chapter and the "As we all know" schtick. When writers feel the need to explain everything right away to their readers, it shows that they have a lack of confidence in their reader's ability to think through a situation, or even have the patience to wait for an answer. They think they're simply trying to be nice to their readers, and keep them coming back for more, but in reality, it's insulting. I know when I read stuff written like that I always feel like I'm being babied, like they don't think I could handle not knowing something, or they have to spoon-feed me the information or else I'll never get it. Either that, or I'm just bored out of my skull.

"I tell people STORIES"

These guys are much like the 'tell' people, except they aren't quite as interested in the craft. They're more interested in the actual goings-on of the story itself. They don't really care how the story is told as long as it's being told. They also don't care much about the readers, or at least, what the readers want. The readers are going to get what they write, and they're just going to have to accept it and move on. These people do not pander to what the masses want. They are going to say what they think regardless of what anyone else says.

This is the group that can fall into the opposite problem of the 'people' emphasized group. They can often err on the side of too little information. They want to keep that suspense going for as long as they can because they want the story's great reveal to be as epic as possible, or they hold off a ton in the beginning because they want to make their novel a really great, steady increase in tension and pace.

This too can work well if used properly, but if it's used to the extreme, you'll lose a lot of people at the beginning when they get too confused and/or too bored with the slowness of the pace.

So what's a writer to do?

Well, if you want to know what I think (and I assume you do if you're still reading this post up to this point), I think you need to be able to balance all four aspects of that core sentence. "I tell people stories" To a certain extent, you have to see yourself as a respectable writer, with something important to say. Something that's good enough, or interesting enough, or important enough that as many people as possible should hear it.

You need to have a good grasp on what it means to tell stories effectively. If your craft is terrible, then your excellent story and drive may be lost to your readers. They may become confused, irritated, and impatient with you if you can't handle a pen properly.

You need to be able to tell a story that people can enjoy. In the end, if you want to get published, you have to think about how other people are going to read your book, and what they're going to take away from it. However, in keeping with the last word, you can't let your fear of what people will think take away from what your story is really all about.

It's okay if what you write doesn't appeal to everyone! In fact, it most certainly will not appeal to everyone! And you know what? That's okay. If your story needs to be told, then by all means tell it. But don't get caught up in the "that's what everybody wants" cycle. You may earn lots of money doing that, but I'll tell you one thing, you will not earn my loyalty or respect.

And that to me, is what makes a good writer... wait, what was this post about again?
How far down does the rabbit hole go?
As we all know, Alice in Wonderland references are very cliche, and you should really avoid using them.

WHICH BRINGS ME BACK TO MY ORIGINAL POINT.

There are better ways to get valuable information to your readers. Don't resort to just flat out telling them in boring or nonsensical ways. You may think they need it, but chances are, they're smarter than that. Don't underestimate the power of your reader's mind. They know much more than you may think.


What writing cliches bother you? What kinds of things just make you cringe when reading a book or watching a movie?

Experience

That oh so wonderful word that can catapult you ahead of everyone else around you, or leave you stuck in first gear for life.

Experience.

"I'm sorry, but we just can't hire someone with your lack of experience."
"Don't worry, just follow my lead, I have experience in these matters."

It's a two-edged sword. One moment it saves your butt, the next it throws you to the ground.

I know for me, experience has been a frustrating thing to deal with. For example, I have lots of experience being told I have no experience in anything. Until this year, I had no experience working a till, I had no experience in retail, or fast-food, or any 9 to 5 job of any kind except summer camp.

And really, does anyone count that as work?

Besides the people who've put that on their resumes?

Just about the only thing I could say that I had experience with was working with kids. I had six years of volunteering in a kid's program under my belt going off to University, as well as working and going to summer camps most of my junior high/high school years.

It got to the point where when I actually tried to get a job in grade 12, because of the work environment of the town I grew up in, I got rejected from every place I applied. Even McDonalds. Yes. I stooped that low. The funny part, was no matter what the outcome I knew I would be relieved. If I did get the job, then I'd finally have some extra money going towards University. If I didn't get it, then Huzzah! No greasy disgusting working conditions!


But this post isn't about fast-food, or about my lack of employment for the majority of my life. It's about how experience affects writing, and why this facet of writing is one of the reasons why I love it so much.

Writing requires no experience.

None.


Inherently, writing (fiction) is all about describing things and feelings that you may have never, nor never will experience yourself. Sure, many stories may be rooted in some experience you may have had, but in the end, few people write fictional stories where they've actually experienced every single thing their viewpoint characters, or even their protagonists, go through.

I may not have time-travelled, and I may have to wait a long time before that happens (don't judge me I can dream), but that doesn't mean I can't write about a character who does just such a thing! I also have exactly 0 experience being a girl. But guess what!? I can write from the perspective of a girl, and sometimes it actually comes across as natural (or so I'd like to think).

Now, when it comes to writing accurately, there does need to be a bit of research done on the topic that's discussed or explored, but I think that's still different than most other jobs. Because, I can have lots of knowledge of how to make hamburgers, and how to count change, but that knowledge doesn't translate to a job hire.

I have never said that it takes no experience to be an author. I think it either takes a great deal of luck and in-born talent to get contracted your first try with your first agent with your first book and be successful. I personally have heard of very few stories similar to this. Most people have to work for many years at the craft of writing to get good, to build up experience, and develop as writers.

At the end of the day though, I can still do what I love without anyone holding me back. The only thing stopping me from writing is getting the time to do it. If I wanted to be a video game designer, I'd have to do a LOT of studying, practicing, and working under others before I could just do whatever I wanted with my own video games. With most careers, you have to spend a long time on the bottom rungs of the corporate ladder before you can rise to the position you actually long for.

As writers, I think a lot of us overlook this immense gift we have. So many people complain about the life of a writer saying how sad it is that they can't just be a writer full-time, or how they still haven't been published after so long wading in anonymity. Seriously, I think a lot of these people need to just wake up and see the amazing gift they've been given with this desire to write.

We don't have to wait all those long arduous years to start doing what we want! We can do it TODAY! No experience required!

I know for me, getting published is a great dream to aspire to, and having other people read my stuff would be tremendous. But I get a great deal of satisfaction just from putting pen to paper and telling a story. Even if I'm the only one to read it.

And no one can ever tell me to stop because I don't have enough experience.

That, my friends, is incredibly freeing.


How has the issue of experience affected your life? Does it frustrate you that people are so picky about it? Or are you more frustrated by the clueless employee who was obviously not hired for his/her expertise?

The Mushy Stuff

You all know exactly what I'm talking about.

Whether you want to admit it or not, we've all seen them. Books that have romantic plot-lines shoved into them just because "they're supposed to" and "everyone expects it".

WHY?! In heaven's name WHY?!!?

I can't tell you how many times I've read a book and thought "This love story was completely unnecessary. Why are these people getting together? It doesn't add to the plot, it doesn't make me like either of these characters more, it doesn't hammer home the theme, it just beefs up the word count and makes me mad at the author."

Some of you are rolling your eyes at this point I'm sure.

"But Seth!" You whine. "Don't you realize that everyone wants to see the boy and girl fall in love with each other? That's what EVERYONE wants!"

Restraining my anger, I respond "No. Actually it is NOT what everyone wants."

Sometimes I feel like Shrek in the first movie where he's trying to explain to Donkey that Ogres are like onions because they have layers. Donkey says something about cakes having layers, and that everyone loves cakes. Honestly, to all those people who say romance is what everyone wants in a novel, I just want to say

"I don't CARE what everybody likes!! Romance is not a necessary ingredient in making a successful book!"

This is an issue I'm kinda passionate about in case you haven't noticed. It's something I've had people ask me about several times, and to be honest, I can't usually give an answer that will satisfy them. Basically, I'm fine with the whole "boy meets girl" storyline, as long as it makes sense within the confines of the story world, and what the author is trying to get across with the book.

I can think of two examples that illustrate what I mean. First, is a book idea that I LOVED when I heard about it, but didn't love quite so much when I actually read it because of a love triangle that in my opinion did not need to be there.

The Hunger Games.

Yes, I went there.

When I first heard about this, (before the movie was even on the radar) I thought it sounded great. Gladiator was one of my favourite movies growing up, and I figured this would be basically that, only more intense because it's a book, so you can really get inside the person's head and everything. I especially liked the family dynamics and loyalty threads I saw in the first chapter or so. It was all really promising. I could see it all working out wonderfully with Katniss volunteering and Gale getting picked from the ballot. They would be two friends pitted against each other till the bitter end, and then one would die, and the other would have to go back alone. Very touching. Very sad. Awesome story.

Then HE showed up. The bread guy. (Facepalm)

This was a classic example of "I hate you. No, I love you. No actually, I hate you, because I love this other guy! Who I now hate." On and on it went. Seriously, the whole thing just sickened me. I don't know if this guy was in Mrs. Collins' plans to begin with or something, but for me, he just made the whole thing a lot less enjoyable. I would have much preferred just reading a gripping tale of survival, loyalty, and friendship. At the end of the day, what did you walk away with from this story? Was it "Wow, that was a really cool post-apocalyptic landscape with intense action, and great characters!" or did your response sound more like "TEAM PEETA! No! TEAM GALE!!"

I honestly loved the story throughout the first book, and the first three quarters of the second, but for me, she took a great idea and made it a lot more shallow by pandering to what 'everybody' wants, and putting love in where it really didn't have to be.


Now for my second example, which will be Ender's Game. This was a book that I really really enjoyed, and guess what? The hero doesn't fall in love with ANYBODY!! Gasp! It can't be! Say it ain't so!

But it is.

This is a prime example of a book that really nailed it in pretty much every way. The characters were really awesome, I felt so connected and sympathetic toward Ender, and at the same time the villains were evil, but not so evil as to become caricatures. The plot was tight, with a twist that I personally never saw coming. The only complaint being that it almost felt like he ended one book and went into the prologue of a second near the end. And the theme was really powerful. I felt like there wasn't a lot of added fluff with this. It all felt right.

Ender did not have to have a love interest to be interesting. He didn't need someone back home to be fighting for to make him motivated. He didn't need some girl swooning over him to make his dangerous situations seem somehow more perilous because he needed to be able to see her face again. He was perfectly capable of carrying the story on his own. For me, this was a much needed breath of fresh air.

Too many times I think we get stuck in our rules of convention. We seem to think that books should be a certain way simply because everyone expects them to be as such, and because it's always been like that. I say that you shouldn't have anything happen in a novel that doesn't have a purpose. That goes for unnecessary explosions and car chases too! Sometimes, you just have to take a good hard look at it all and ask yourself "If I took this aspect of the book out, would it really be worse off?"


When I write any kind of love story into a book I'm working on, I never do it simply because I think fans will like it. I do it if it will demonstrate a point, or if it will enhance my themes, or deepen my characters. It's not something flippant for me, and I don't think it should be treated so carelessly by writers these days. It seems like people think that no matter how bad your writing is, if you can make a good love story out of it you'll sell millions.

Sadly enough, this almost seems to be the case.


Do you agree? Disagree? Let your voice be heard! Is there anything wrong with romance in novels? When and why? Or why not?

P.S. Don't worry, not all my posts will sound like rants. These were simply the first posts to get finished. The next post will not be a rant, I promise! :P

General Target Audience

For my first post, I thought it would be good to clarify who I'm writing for when I come up with an idea. If you're like me, there are times when an idea comes to you that you just have to share, and for me, I share through novels, and sometimes short stories and poetry. But who do I write for? Most of the time, it's something that's just for me. Something I need to get out or I'll burst. Other times it's something that I want to show my close friends and family. Finally there are some ideas that I want as many people as possible to hear about. These ideas are the ones that take a while to explain. They're the ones that need time to progress, and sink into your head. Those ideas are often my favourite kind, and take thousands of words to express. So who do I write for when I want to get these ideas out?

My ideal reader is someone who’s not afraid to think. Think about the way society works, about how we treat other people, about morality, and about themselves. They like to see the advancement of technology, and are curious as to the possibilities of that advancement. They want a hero who starts out afraid, weak and unwillingly, but becomes something more for the good of others. Someone who will sacrifice their own life in the end because they know it’s the right thing to do. My readers want to feel, strongly. They may laugh once in a while, but it’s not really why they’re reading my book. When they read my book they’re on the verge of tears, or they’re shouting at my main character to stay alive. They want a thrill, they want passion, they want love. But not as the central focus. If there’s any love you can keep that in the side story. Love story plot lines are so predictable and cliché that it would be criminal to spotlight them in my stories.

My reader wants to be shocked, they want blood and guts. They want a twist that makes them stop reading to recover from the blow to the head. They want a book that they could not possibly know what will happen next, and they want to be completely engulfed in the story. Drowning in it. They want to be able to miss a fire drill because they can’t hear the alarm over the sound of my character running from assassins, or jumping out of a building, or going back in time to save a loved one.

My reader wants more. They want more of everything, technology, conflict, war, conspiracy... they want to see the nasty underbelly of the people we respect and love. They want to know the gruesome truth no matter what the cost. They want to hear the unadulterated facts, and then sift through the waters to find the meaning. They want to make choices for themselves. They want to see the main character break the rules, push harder, and dive deeper than anyone thought they could. They want a main character who defies expectations. One that changes as a result of the story. They want someone that they might not have even liked in the first few chapters to become the person they are most desperate not to lose. They want to hear about the tough choices in life. The live or die questions. The ones that dictate who we are, and what others think of us. They want to know why their bad guy’s so mean. They don’t just want to be told that he’s awful and then leave it at that. They want to see it happen. See him fall from the Light Side and creep down slowly into the abyss of darkness. They want to see his heart break, twist, and turn to hatred. They want to see it all, and wish it wasn’t happening, because suddenly they realize that they love this bad guy, and they can’t bear to see him end up like that.

My ideal reader is the person who wants the nitty gritty truth of everything no matter what.

Is that you?